


the bruise within you

by escherzo



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Canon Asexual Character, Developing Relationship, M/M, Season 1, a large heap of internalized acephobia on Jon's part, ace subtype: high libido with no directionality to it whatsoever
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-30
Updated: 2020-08-30
Packaged: 2021-03-07 00:27:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,608
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26187940
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/escherzo/pseuds/escherzo
Summary: What is he supposed to say when Tim asks for an actual explanation, “Tim, I'm not interested in sex, except for how I'm constantly preoccupied by it?” It barely makes sense to him some days. And Tim is his best friend. He can't just—not answer.
Relationships: Jonathan "Jon" Sims | The Archivist/Tim Stoker
Comments: 24
Kudos: 226





	the bruise within you

**Author's Note:**

> as mentioned in the tags, jon's got a whooole lot of internalized shit stored up, so fair warning there. I'm not super sure about how this one came out (I feel like it's a little closer to Very Special Episode territory than I usually try to do) but hopefully I'm just being weird about it because I've been staring at it too long.
> 
> (it's hard to tell exactly how close of friends tim/jon are in s1 canon, but definitely a bit less than depicted here I think)

“So anyway,” Tim continues, “I got his number from the girl who works the other shift—Angela, _lovely_ woman—and...”

Jon stares into his drink, running a finger up and down the side of the glass to draw patterns in the condensation, only half-listening. It's been a long while since Tim and Sasha managed to drag him out for drinks (“for old time's sake! C'mon, boss. You've been here since six, you said so yourself.”) and his body is pleasantly warm, his limbs loose. The tips of his fingers tingle a bit. Sasha is off talking to an old uni friend she spotted, somewhere in another corner of this little hole in the wall pub, and so it's just Tim and Jon, sitting across the scratched-wood table from each other, empty plates with a few scattered remnants of chips between them. Jon tries to not let his mind wander, but it drifts to something he read this morning, fleeting words about the main character's gasp as she was pinned to the wall by the creature that had stolen its way into her rooms, and a sharp, painful twist of heat curls in the pit of his stomach. He squeezes his thighs together.

“... and he said he'd answer my questions, but it seemed like he wanted to answer them _later_ , you know? And so we went back to his apartment and—oh, shit, sorry, I know you don't like listening to this stuff.” 

Jon blinks back into full awareness, mouth set in a flat line. “I don't what?”

“You _know_. You always get this _look_ on your face when this comes up. When we were new in research and I barely knew you I thought you were just kind of a dickhead, you know, Tim's going on about guys, ew,” Tim cuts himself off to laugh a little and takes a sip of his beer. “But you did it when I mentioned a lady friend, too, so, you know, message received, Jon's a little uptight, he doesn't like hearing about sex.”

“I am not _uptight_ ,” Jon protests, and Tim just raises a very pointed eyebrow. “Fine. Fine, maybe I have... uptight tendencies.” He ignores Tim's widening grin and the way he echoes _uptight tendencies_ under his breath. He's not entirely sure what makes him say the rest, other than that he's lost count of how many pints he's had, and before he can stop himself the words are out of his mouth. “But I think about sex literally _all the time._ ” 

Tim stares at him, mouth hanging open slightly. He's not blinking. 

Jon drains the rest of his beer in one go. 

There's a very long pause and then Tim asks, “ _what_?”, voice gone up an octave, and mercy of all mercies, Sasha takes this moment to swan back over to their table with her friend. Jon shoots Tim a look and mouths _later_.

“Stop staring holes into Jon,” Sasha says, grinning as she slings an arm around the person next to her, a tiny snub-nosed woman with violently green short hair. “So this is Michaela! We used to do theatre together, you should have seen her in this one production we did my first year, I think it was called...” 

Jon's hoping _later_ is never, but from the way Tim is still shooting glances at him, he's probably not going to get that lucky.

*

Waking up the next morning with a hangover pounding in his skull and twisting his guts is not an ideal start to the day. Even less so when he remembers what was said. _Christ,_ he thinks, scowling as he forces himself out of bed and to the kitchen to make some eggs. _I'm never drinking with Tim again._

And what is he supposed to say when Tim asks for an actual explanation, “Tim, I'm not interested in sex, except for how I'm constantly preoccupied by it?” It barely makes sense to him some days. And Tim is his best friend. He can't just—not answer. 

It would be so much _easier_ to just be normal. To be like Tim. To get to laugh about hookups and go on regular dates and not have this enormous, looming thing hanging over anything romantic he's ever attempted. No one wants a partner who looks at their naked body and doesn't physically respond in the slightest, but still needs to masturbate every day and never wants any help with it. No one wants someone who flinches away from kissing with tongue because it just feels _strange_ if it does nothing for you, but is constantly preoccupied milling through old bits of erotica in their head. 

He loved Georgie, but she'd strip out of her shirt and brush her hair back and smile at him, eyes full of heat, and she'd see the way his expression didn't change and there her smile would go, slipping away to nothing. After a while, she stopped initiating, even though he was perfectly happy to keep giving _her_ pleasure, much as it was tiring, and sometimes he wished she'd hurry up and come already because he wanted to go to sleep. She told him she could tell his heart wasn't in it, and probably that was true. 

He'd thought he was just gay, for a while, and when he ended up drunk and on dating sites the last year of uni it was mostly men he messaged. But they'd send him pictures, and expect reactions that weren't _that certainly is a penis_ , and he'd found he was just as unable to muster that. The handful of ill-advised hookups beyond that didn't go any better. He could get himself off in ten minutes, easy, but as soon as someone else was involved nothing worked anymore. 

If he was just—wholly uninterested, that would be simple. He could laugh and say, “I missed my calling as a monk,” and probably Tim would be fine with that. 

_But no_ , he thinks sourly, scraping his eggs from the pan and onto a plate. No, his body somehow missed the memo that sex ranges from uncomfortable at best to painful at worst when it involves other people. Even now, thinking about how enormously awkward it's going to be to face Tim, his mind is starting to wander to his phone and to the things he could read before work, to the videos he has bookmarked. He's got an hour. Plenty of time to get off and still have time for a shower.

He could explain. Fully, properly. He's resigned himself to the fact that his issues mean he'll be single for the rest of his life. But all he's going to get from Tim is _pity_. 

“Fuck,” he says, head in his hands. “Maybe he won't remember I said it.” 

*

“Gooood morning, boss!” Tim says, too loud, as Jon opens the door to the Archives, and Jon flinches at the volume. Fuck him for still somehow being immune to serious hangovers at his age, Jon thinks sourly. He rubs his temples. 

“Tim,” Jon says, trying to put on his best boss voice. “Is that necessary?” 

“Sure it is,” Tim says, grinning. “Wanted to let you know I got ahold of Mrs. Kasuma. For case 0071304? I'm meeting her for coffee at twelve. So hopefully we can find out something about the haunted house.”

“ _Allegedly_ haunted,” Jon says, rubbing his eyes. “I still think it's much more likely that this is Mr. Lensik's schizophrenia at play.” 

“I mean, probably,” Tim says, unbothered. “But come on, it's been _ages_ since we've had a proper haunted house. Let me live in hope.” 

“Fine,” Jon sighs. “Anything else?”

“I got in like ten minutes ago,” Tim says. “Give me time! But Sasha did say she found another one that won't record on her laptop. It's on your desk.” 

It's going to be a long day. Jon can feel it already.

*

Tim pops his head in again around lunch, just as Jon is starting to get into the search results for Robert Montauk that are less sensationalist nonsense and more actual useful case information. It's been a slog, to say the least. 

“By the way,” Tim says, and Jon startles, blinking up at him. “Do you want to come over Saturday? My flatmate's going to be up in Manchester visiting his mum, so I figured we could get takeaway, watch some terrible ghost hunting shows. I _know_ you don't have any plans.” 

“I could have plans!” Jon protests, and Tim raises his eyebrows. “... Fine, yes, that sounds... that sounds fine. Now if you don't mind, I am trying to work.”

“Right,” Tim beams. “It'll be good to talk.” He waggles his eyebrows, and Jon's stomach sinks. So much for Tim not remembering what he said last night.

*

Tim greets him at the door to his flat Saturday afternoon in a ratty old band t-shirt and with the front of his hair newly-dyed a vibrant purple. It's a good look for him, Jon thinks idly, as he toes off his shoes. The flat is warm and cozy, a tiny thing covered in photos and knickknacks and books, and when Jon huffs out a sigh and collapses onto the ancient overstuffed couch in the front room and it wheezes with his weight, it's almost like he can close his eyes and be back in his Research days again. No responsibilities to sort out a mess not of his own making. No one expecting him to know what to _do_ unless he's told. 

“That bad?” Tim asks, sitting down beside him. 

“You want to take over?” Jon asks, not opening his eyes. He's supposed to be maintaining more professional distance than this. Really shouldn't, by all rights, have accepted Tim's offer to come over. But he's tired, and it's been an unbearably long week, and for a while he wants to just—not think. 

“I'll pass,” Tim says. “Thinking of getting Indian, you still want your usual?” He leans his head against Jon's shoulder for a moment, just a reassuring little tap, and Jon can't help but smile at it. 

“Yes please,” he says, stretching out a little. “So which embarrassment to our field were you planning on watching?” 

Tim finishes putting in their orders on his phone and digs around in the couch cushion for a moment for the remote. “Found it last week—it's called 'Spooktacular Stories' and it is exactly as terrible as it sounds.” 

“I hate it already,” Jon confirms, and later, when he's halfway through a mouthful of lamb vindaloo and snarking at the television, “oh of _course_ the only explanation is that the inn's ghost altered peoples' memories. Couldn't possibly be that literally all of your eyewitnesses were drunk at the time,” he realizes he hasn't thought about work in at least an hour. It's a weight lifted he's been carrying so long he'd almost stopped registering it. 

“Maybe the pints themselves were haunted,” Tim says, waggling his fingers in an 'ooh, spooky' sort of way. “By the way--”

“Hmm?” 

“I did want to ask, about what you said when we were down the pub with Sasha?” Tim must see the way Jon's face falls, because he hastens to add, “You don't _have_ to tell me. I'm just—surprised. I guess I thought...” He swallows, pauses for a long moment. “I figured you weren't interested in any of that, and so I assumed I didn't have a chance. With you. And if I still don't, you can tell me to fuck off and I'll drop it, I promise.” 

_Oh good lord_ , Jon thinks, blinking at Tim. He'd just been figuring Tim was curious because Tim gets nosy about _everyone's_ relationships, not—this. Tim is looking right at him, a soft, faintly hopeful smile on his lips, his big brown eyes so warm, and Jon doesn't want to turn him down, but...

“I...” Jon hesitates. “Let me explain? I suspect _you'll_ be the uninterested one, after.”

“Doubt it.”

Jon gives him a strained smile. “You'll see.” He hesitates again and then closes his eyes. It's easier, when he doesn't have to meet Tim's eyes for this. “So. If you were naked in front of me right now, even though you are—objectively handsome, nothing would happen for me. I've never had sex that wasn't uncomfortable or painful, and I don't know that I'm capable of it. I can—give, a bit, but if it takes too long that can be an issue. My libido is apparently _unaware_ of these facts, and so I end up thinking about sex a truly distracting amount. I... take matters into my own hands there. But I'm not involved in my own fantasies, and neither is my partner. And no one wants a partner like that. I have... extensive experience in that fact.” 

“Well, first of all,” Tim begins, and Jon realizes that his heart is beating fast enough to make him a little dizzy, “that last part can fuck off. So. Couple of questions.”

“... Alright,” Jon says, hesitant. 

“What about the rest? Kissing, cuddling, going on dates, all of that.”

“I don't like, uh, tongue,” Jon says, flushing a little. “But the rest is fine. I, I like the rest.” 

Tim nods. “Right-o. Question the second! First I just want to say that _taking matters into your own hands_ is now a phrase that is ruined for me forever, because all I will think about when someone says it is you jerking off, but anyway, how do you feel about someone watching?”

Jon thinks for a moment. “Neutral?” he offers. “As long as you don't... comment on what I'm watching or reading, or expect me to be looking at you, it's alright.” 

“I can work with that, I think,” Tim says. “We're not...” His smile goes a little wry. “I mean, I won't say we're the _most_ sexually compatible? But if you don't mind if I'm not exclusive I don't think that'll be a huge problem. And yes, I know, I know, office romance drama, you're my boss, etcetera, but I don't think you actually care that much about that.”

He's right; Jon doesn't, though he probably _should_ , on some level. 

“You never did say whether or not you were actually turning me down, though,” Tim says. 

Jon blinks. “... I suppose I figured you would turn _me_ down after that.” 

“This is me, not doing that.”

“Oh. Well. I don't want to either,” Jon says, and Tim grins. 

“Right, then,” Tim says, and then scoots a little closer, sliding an arm around Jon's shoulders. His thigh is warm and solid against Jon's, and it's—nice. It's just nice, being close like this. He looks down at the two of them, and then back up to Tim's face, and when Tim leans closer, he tilts his head up to meet Tim's lips. They're warm, and soft, and Jon closes his eyes and sinks into the feeling, into the comfort of having someone else so close. Tim's mouth tastes faintly of curry, a little twinge of heat against his own lips, and he laughs a little at the way it makes them tingle.

Tim pulls back a little, resting his forehead against Jon's. “Still okay?” he asks, and his voice is softer than Jon has ever heard it before. 

“Yes,” Jon says, closing his eyes again. Tim looks so _happy_ , and it makes his heart hurt a little. “I will warn you, when it comes to real dates, I am tremendously out of practice.” 

“That's alright,” Tim says. “We can practice.” 

He leans down and kisses Jon again, and Jon can feel the smile against his lips.


End file.
